Horrorstör by Grady Hendrix

This book is so much fun.

Horrorstör takes place in an IKEA-alike store called Orsk (Need help? Just Orsk.) The main character is Amy. Amy transferred to the store from another closer to home to try to improve her life and get away from her mother's trailer park. But, she's having trouble keeping up with her rent and hasn't managed to get ahead at work so she's put in for a transfer.

Meanwhile, strange things are happening at the store during the hours it's closed and each morning damage is being found. When Amy's boss decides that he needs a few people to stay overnight and patrol the store to find the perpetrator of the damage, she balks until he offers her extra pay. He also enlists the help of a second employee that everyone loves. And, then, the three of them discover two other employees have stowed away, so to speak, to do some ghost hunting at Orsk after finding out that it sits on the location of a former prison.

So, there are 5 characters: the failure, the uptight boss who really is insecure, the sweet and innocent spinster, the overenthusiastic ghost hunter, and the guy who just wants to get the girl and find fame and fortune (or the "user", I guess).

The first half of the book, approximately, is mostly set-up and it's a delight. Grady Hendrix has a wonderful, light touch so there's a lot of humor and you get to know the characters well before he ramps up the horror aspect of the book. Then, the suspense and terror gradually build as the ghosts come out, bent on tormenting the employees and breaking their wills.

Highly recommended - I'm not a horror fan and I found this book more gruesome and yucky than scary so it was very tolerable for me. I looked at the ratings of friends at Goodreads and they were mostly 3- and 4-star ratings so that may not be true for normal horror readers. I gave it 5 because I found the story so hard to put down and I loved the touches of humor, loved the way Amy grows in the story, and thought the ending was solid. I just noticed people are talking about a newer book by Grady Hendrix, a couple days ago. You can bet I will be looking into that one, as well.


©2020 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Warren the 13th and the Whispering Woods by Tania del Rio and Will Staehle

I read Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye in September of 2016 and loved it so much that I knew I'd want to continue reading about Warren when a second book came out. And, I didn't forget about Warren. He's a marvelous character - crazy to look at (that strange mouth!) but unusually mature for a young boy. He solves puzzles, unravels mysteries, escapes from tricky situations, and then saves the day.

You can read my review of the first book, here:

Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye

In the second installment, Warren the 13th and the Whispering Woods, Warren's walking hotel (yes, seriously, it walks) has come close to a place where witches hang out and Warren wants to get away from it as quickly as possible. But, then the hotel has a disastrous accident. It trips and falls over. A sticky drink gets into the control panel, so it can't quickly be righted. And, all the guests abandon the hotel, grumbling. Then things get even worse.

Warren goes off in search of some de-stickifier to repair the control panel that makes the hotel move, and in the process is fooled and trapped by a mimic. Now, the mimic (a creature who, with the help of something he stole, looks exactly like Warren) is on the loose and he's taking over the hotel. There are witches in search of revenge and dangerous creatures called sap-squatches in the Whispering Woods. In order to save the hotel, Warren will have to catch up to it, save a friend, fight off the witches, get rid of the mimic, and figure out what's up with the sap-squatches and the angry trees.

The publicity for the Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye said it's for ages 8-12 and I mentioned thinking it could be read to a younger audience without any problems. I believe that is also true of Warren the 13th and the Whispering Woods and I think Warren is a particularly great character, much like Harry Potter. He's a good person, hard-working and thoughtful, quick to make friends but sometimes a little blind to danger. The cast of hotel workers and friends from the first book aid him in various ways (or cause trouble). They're like an oddball family.

Highly recommended - Every bit as fun and creative as the first Warren the 13th book, with lots of plot twists and some surprising new friendships, Warren the 13th and the Whispering Woods is a creepy delight. Warren is a wonderful character. There's a lot of magic, good and bad, and Warren's world is enchanting and unique. I thought I saw mention online of a 3rd Warren the 13th book in the works. I hope so. I'd love this series to keep going on for a very long time.


©2018 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Princesses Behaving Badly by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie

Princesses Behaving Badly by Linda Rodriguez McRobbie is a nonfiction book with short biographies of princesses real and fake (apparently, pretending to be a princess is a thing) across many centuries. It's divided into the following sections:

Warriors: Princesses who fought their own battles
Usurpers: Princesses who grabbed power in a man's world
Schemers: Princesses who plotted and planned
Survivors: Princesses who made controversial and questionable choices
Partiers: Princesses who loved to live it up
Floozies: Princesses notorious for their sexy exploits
Madwomen: Princesses who were likely mad, or close to it

Some of those categories interested me more than others and some princesses were more interesting or appealing or weird or just plain fun to read about than others. I enjoyed reading about Hatshepsut, for example, because I'd read about her being erased from Egyptian history and then rediscovered later but knew very little about her, beyond that. Rodriguez McRobbie explained the erasure in a different way than I'd read about in the past and I learned a lot more about the actual person. Princess Margaret's story was interesting, too, as I knew she was always considered a troublemaker and a jealous sister but apparently I didn't pay much attention to the details of her life. For those who aren't familiar with her, Princess Margaret was Queen Elizabeth II's younger sister.

It took me a while to get into Princesses Behaving Badly because of the writing style, which is a bit dry and inaccessible (and slow). I didn't consider abandoning it, but I just wasn't enjoying the book, at first, and then at some point I realized what it's problems were and got used to the pace. Then, I started to enjoy reading about the princesses and the courageous, evil, crazy, etc., things they did. I looked up a few of them online to see images or photographs of them and some of them interested me enough that I'd like to read more about them. A handful were people I'd read about peripherally and got to know a little better and some were the wives of famous men I was familiar with (the Prince Regent, namesake of the Regency Period, for example).

My biggest problem with Princesses Behaving Badly is the problem I had, In general, with history in school. History requires a bit of storytelling flair to be fully accessible, in my humble opinion. Throw too many names, dates, and/or locations at a person (at least, this person) and it all just goes over their head. Occasionally, this author would not only throw in a date where the age of the princess would have done, but then would also give her age in the next paragraph when referring to something that happened at another time, so that you knew her age in one case but not the other. Sheesh. Just tell the reader how old the heroine was when each event happened, rather than make us subtract to figure it out. Even saying, "When Ignatia was 27, in 1543, the ceiling fell on her head" would have worked fine and added few words. The result is a bunch of bios that alternately make your head hurt and mesmerize.

Recommended hestitantly - I enjoyed Princesses Behaving Badly more, the farther I read. But, I still found it stiff and dry. It could have been a much more interesting book. So, mixed feelings on this one but I would say if you like reading about women who broke the mold and don't mind a book of historical bios that's a bit slow, go for it. Just don't expect sparkling descriptions and a quick read. 


©2018 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains by Jon Morris

They say you should dress for the job you want, not the job you have. If the intergalactic Dr. Voodoo is following that advice, it's difficult to say what job he's aiming for. Clad in tuxedo and tails, he seems more prepared for a career as a maitre d' or a cartoon mayor than as the servant of an ever-living goddess of evil. 

[...]

When Lilith's planet -- also called Lilith -- is destroyed in a battle with Wonder Man, Dr. Voodoo searches for a new seat of the empire. But the queen of evil considers Earth her rightful domain. Harried and henpecked, Voodoo has no choice but to comply. 

Dr. Voodoo and his allies disappeared from Wonder Man's ongoing narrative, though the hero's saga continued for a few more issues. Perhaps Voodoo was marshaling his anthozoons when he should have been recharging his frigitrons for another attack on Earth's peaceful cosmoplanes.

~p. 60

I'll have to take an interior shot of The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains by Jon Morris (page down . . . it'll be here, by the time I post this review) because a view of one spread gives you a pretty good idea of what you're in for when you open the book.

With a sly sense of humor, author Jon Morris describes various villains, which hero was the villain's enemy, where and when the character appeared and what happened to him (some of them appear and then simply fade away, some are quickly dispatched, some bumble around practically asking to be exterminated).

The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains, published by Quirk Books, is the follow-up to The League of Regrettable Superheroes, which I have not read but am now totally dying to read. A friend read The League of Regrettable Superheroes and went straight to her library to request Supervillains when I posted it in my stack of arrivals. She had to exercise patience because it had not yet been released. But, it has now! And, you'll want to grab a copy if you're a fan of old comic books.

Beginning with The Golden Age, from 1938-1949, The Legion of Regrettable Supervillains describes a time period, progressing forward, and then goes into details about various villains. Occasionally, there will be a spread with interior shots from one of the comic books (they're readable, thank goodness), and sometimes a spread will contain brief blurbs about 5 or 6 supervillains who bore similarities to those who are described in greater detail. The result is a book that gives you a good sense of the historical perspective in which the books were written (so many Hitler-like villains in the years before and after WWII) as well as a broad look at a variety of villains, some of whom were clearly more regrettable than others.

Interior shot! Hopefully, you'll be able to enlarge it for a better view.

Highly recommended - Comic fans, in particular, will enjoy this book but I'm not exactly what you could call a comic fangirl and I thought the book was a total delight. I read it slowly, maybe 10 villains per night, and found it immensely entertaining. It's the kind of book you can't shut up about. While I was reading, I'd read excerpts to my husband or tell him some funny little factoid about a supervillain, read one of the humorous side notes written by the author (on the supervillain Colossus: "Earth shirt size XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXL"). Loads of fun and would make a great gift as it is one freaking gorgeous book.

©2017 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Geekerella by Ashley Poston

I'm pretty sure I didn't know what the cover of Geekerella by Ashley Poston looked like when I accepted a copy for review. And, I'm almost positive I would have just skipped right over the offer, if I had. Thank goodness I didn't see the cover - which, obviously, I did not fall in love with (although it is very fitting) - and read the description with care because Geekerella is by far one of my favorite reads of the year, so far.

Elle lives in Charleston with a snippy stepmother Catherine and two stepsisters, Chloe and Calliope, all of whom would happily take her house and kick her out, if not for the fact that Elle will own their home as soon as she turns 18. Elle is a big fan of a cult classic TV show Starfield and a relatively unknown blogger and fan fiction writer. But, when she finds out her beloved Prince Carmindor is going to be played by teen actor Darien Freeman in a movie reboot, she writes a sharply-worded blog post about the terrible casting decision and the post is widely read. When she finds out about the cosplay contest at ExcelsiCon, the convention her father created, Elle decides she must try to win. Maybe it will be her ticket out of Charleston and away from her evil stepmother.

Darien is a teen star who has been pushed to succeed by his father. But, he really is a geek, at heart. Starfield is his long-time favorite show. He used to attend the annual sci-fi convention till the terrible betrayal of a friend along with stardom combined to keep him away. Now, as the star of the new Starfield movie, Darien is supposed to attend ExcelsiCon and judge a cosplay contest. As soon as he gets the news, he tries to locate the head of ExcelsiCon so he can talk his way out of it. Unable to get through, he texts the number at the ExcelsiCon website and ends up chatting with a fan of the show . . . one who does not like him as an actor at all.

While Darien and Elle develop a sweet texting relationship, Elle works in a vegan food truck called The Magic Pumpkin, writes her blog, and tries to figure out how she can get one of her parents' old cosplay costumes to work for her. Meanwhile, the evil stepmother has decided that she wants to sell the house - a house that really belongs to Elle - and one of her stepsisters has decided she must win the ExcelsiCon cosplay contest so she can attend the dance with Darien, even though she has no interest in Starfield at all.

Highly recommended - I cannot say enough good things about Geekerella. It is an absolute delight. The geeky aspect is incredibly authentic, from the description of the ExcelsiCon convention to the incredibly detailed storyline of Starfield. In fact, I was so impressed with the description of Starfield that I found myself wishing it really existed. I would happily watch the show if it did. But, what truly made Geekerella wonderful was the relationships. Sage, the daughter of the woman who owns The Magic Pumpkin, seems odd and distant at first, but she and Elle become fast friends. The texting friendship between Elle and Darien builds nice and slowly and eventually becomes incredibly romantic. And, because the book doesn't strictly follow the Cinderella storyline, there is a lovely surprise involving one of the stepsisters.

I particularly recommend Geekerella to anyone who likes an upbeat, romantic story about lonely misfits, anyone who enjoys sci-fi and/or fan fiction, and anyone looking for a totally charming upper. I read Geekerella just after finishing 2 of the March graphic novels and The Handmaid's Tale. It was the perfect antidote to both the horrors of reading about people being beaten while they fought for civil rights and a dark, dystopian read.


©2017 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Wonder Women by Sam Maggs

[Emma Edmonds] knew she deserved a military pension, but she also knew it would be difficult to convince the government she truly had fought in the war (even though it's probable that nearly four hundred women were active in the Civil War). So she did the most dramatic thing possible: at a reunion of her Michigan Infantry division, she showed up in full skirts and was like, "Hey guys, it's me, Franklin!" Everyone was utterly confused until her colonel admitted, "I recall many things which ought to have betrayed her, except that no one thought of finding a woman in a soldier's dress."

~ fr. p. 112 of Wonder Women, Advance Reader Copy (some changes may have been made to the final print version)


Wonder Women: 25 Innovators, Inventors, and Trailblazers Who Changed History by Sam Maggs is packed full of mini biographies of women for whom the term "kick-ass" is maybe a little mild. Going back as far as hundreds of years, author Sam Maggs tells stories of women with amazing skills and talents who refused to hide their abilities or let them die away for the sake of the menfolk.

Told in a breezy, modern style, Wonder Women describes the challenges each of these amazing women faced and how and why most of these historical powerhouses have fallen into obscurity. The short reason: men like taking credit, if not outright stealing, the work of people they consider inferior.

Each small chapter opens with an illustration and a quotation. The opening chapter, for example, describes Wang Zhenyi, a Chinese astronomer, mathematician, and poet who was active in the 18th century. Her quote:

"It's made to believe Women are same as Men; are you not convinced Daughters can also be heroic?"

The contents are divided into the following sections:

• Women of Science
• Women of Medicine
• Women of Espionage
• Women of Innovation
• Women of Adventure

At the end of each of these sections is a Q & A with a living woman who has experienced or is currently working in a male-dominated field:

• Dr. Lynn Conway - Computer Scientist, Electrical Engineer, and Science Educator
• Dr. Buddhini Samarasinghe - Molecular Biologist, Cancer Researcher and Founder of STEM Women
• Lindsay Moran - Author, Journalist, and Former CIA Operative (I reviewed her book: Blowing My Cover)
• Erica Baker - Engineer
• Mika McKinnon - Field Geophysicist, Disaster Researcher, and Science Writer

Highly recommended - Wonder Women is the kind of book that ought to be required reading for both sexes -- girls, so they know they can do whatever they choose if they're willing to put out the effort, boys so they don't go around thinking girls are inferior. I don't know the age range -- although, admittedly, I'm actually skeptical of age ranges, anyway, knowing that some children are into adult novels and nonfiction well before adulthood -- but I know I would have enjoyed it around the age of 10-12 and I wouldn't limit it to pre-high schoolers. The writing style is very modern. Sometimes that bothered me (particularly when the author said "skillz" rather than spelling the word "skills" properly) but I do think that style makes Wonder Women particularly accessible to the younger crowd and that is, of course, its intended audience.

Quirk Books is having a pre-order promotion. Included in the offer is a set of wallpapers for phone, tablet, and desktop (free with purchase) and a drawing for signed, framed prints. Click through this link to read about it and find the sign-up widget:

Pre-Order Offer: Wonder Women by Sam Maggs

The Quirk Books website is an awfully fun place to hang out, by the way. I highly recommend bookmarking it for future fun.

©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye by Tania del Rio and Will Staehle

My reading has slowed down significantly, this week, thanks to the insomnia I mentioned earlier in the week, so I was very pleased when I started reading Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye and realized that I'd opened a book that was impossible to put down, even given how difficult it has been to focus.

Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye is about a little boy who faces a number of challenges and must solve a mystery to save his family's hotel. Warren is the 13th in a long line of Warrens and the eventual heir to his family's hotel since his father, Warren the 12th, died. However, he won't officially inherit the hotel till he turns 18 and Warren is still young, so it has been run by his uncle Rupert for about 6 years. Rupert is incredibly lazy and he's been letting the hotel deteriorate, unwilling to put out the effort of upkeep. It's gotten so bad that they no longer have guests. In the past 4 months, things have become even worse since Rupert married Annaconda.

Auntie Annaconda is a witch who has heard the story of the All-Seeing Eye. Nobody knows what the All-Seeing Eye is (and most don't believe it even exists) but Annaconda assumes it must be something valuable or powerful and she has been slowly tearing up floors and bedding, ripping into walls, and generally creating havoc in the hotel as she searches for clues. Warren is a hard-working boy; he does his best to maintain the hotel and repair the damage done by Auntie Annaconda. The chef and Warren's elderly teacher are his only friends.

Suddenly, a mysterious guest appears at the hotel and then Annaconda's two sisters show up. That's when things begin to get crazy. Will Warren figure out the mystery of the All-Seeing Eye before Annaconda and her sisters completely destroy the hotel? Who is the strange creature in the boiler room and who can be trusted? And, what is the meaning of the strange poem about the All-Seeing Eye?

Where the author and artist take this story is a total delight. And, you must see inside the book to appreciate it. The illustrations are absolutely marvelous:

Highly recommended - You know those rare books that keep you guessing all the way through? Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye is exactly that: surprising, delightful, upbeat, with a terrific young hero. Good, clean, mysterious fun.

I received a copy of Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye from Quirk Books in return for an unbiased review and I'm all full of gushy love. I cannot imagine a child not enjoying it. It's tense but not so scary as to induce nightmares, creative, and seriously . . . those illustrations. I wish I could hold the book up and show the entire thing to you. It would make a whopping fine gift for a youngster (or, just gift yourself - it's got witches; that seems like a decent excuse to buy a copy for the R.I.P. Challenge, if you're participating). The publicity info says it's for ages 8-12. I think you could safely read it to a younger child, no problem.

More good news: In the back of the book, it says Warren and the staff of the Warren Hotel will be returning. Sign me up! I cannot wait to read more. Last night was the best night's insomnia I've had in a long time.


©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Kid Artists by David Stabler, illus. by Doogie Horner

Kid Artists by David Stabler, illustrated by Doogie Horner [Quirk Books; recommended for ages 9-12] is subtitled "True Tales of Childhood from Creative Legends". There are three sections:

• Call of the Wild - describes artists who were inspired by nature,
• It's a Hard-Knock Life - Tells about artists who overcame obstacles like poverty, discrimination, bullying, and frequent moves, and
• Practice Makes Perfect - describes artists who had the great fortune of a mentor or family member who encouraged them.

There's some cross-over between the sections. For example, Frida Kahlo and Andy Warhol both received constant encouragement (so they're in the "Practice Makes Perfect" section) but also experienced the hardships of illness and bullying.

Each chapter provides a mini-bio of an artist that pays particular focus on the challenges and advantages the artists experienced as children. They're very basic bios and some of the artists were unknown to me. In those cases, I ended up going online to read more and view images of their works, which I love. I adore a book that stimulates enough interest to convince you that you must learn more and I can easily visualize how Kid Artists could be used in a classroom for just that purpose.

The stated age range for the book is 9-12 years old. I'd go beyond that in either direction. You could read a chapter per day to a younger crowd and coordinate with an art teacher or individually come up with inexpensive ways to mimic an artist's style. Or, for older students, the ideas could range from doing reports to more serious art projects. Homeschoolers and those who are looking for do-at-home projects could easily create an entire art unit around the book.

Recommended - Don't expect in-depth descriptions; the chapters are reasonably brief and leave out plenty of details of each author's life. It's purpose is to show that those whom we know to have succeeded in art had challenges to deal with just like the rest of us. I think it serves the purpose well and is a great resource. I love the idea that Kid Artists can be used as a jumping-off point for projects. I'm well past the intended age range because I'm a boring old grown-up, but love the idea of trying to imitate some of the artists' styles, just for fun. You're never too old to play.

©2016 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray by Robert Schnakenberg

The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray: A Critical Appreciation of the World's Finest Actor 
by Robert Schnakenberg
Copyright 2015 (This is an assumption; I don't see a copyright date in the book)
Quirk Books - Biography in encyclopedia format/nonfiction
Includes filmography, bibliography, quotes, and numerous photos
272 pp. 

Release Date: September 15, 2015

The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray was my most-wanted fall release, so I was really excited to get the opportunity to review. I love Bill Murray. He's quirky and unpredictable; he becomes even more interesting with age. I can't say there are actually all that many of his movies that I'm in love with, but those that I do like are keepers that the entire family has watched over and over and over, again. Stripes, Ghostbusters and What About Bob? are some of our favorites. And, I learned enough about his movies (some of which I'd never heard about) that I have a list of unwatched Murray movies to seek.

The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray is set up like an encyclopedia of Murray, with topics as diverse as the Chicago Cubs and Nudity, in addition to entries about movies in which he's starred, shrugged off, and even some he never heard about because he neglected to return phone calls. There are anecdotes interspersed, plenty of quotes, and tons of photos.

Things I learned about Bill Murray:

• Bill Murray has a more diverse interest in roles than I realized.
• There are quite a few Murray brothers in the acting business. I was familiar with all of them but didn't realize any were related to Bill.
• He probably wouldn't like me; I don't tolerate alcohol.
• If you run into Bill Murray in public, it's best to just smile at him and look away. He doesn't like being approached. But, he might crash your party if he happens to hear about it and be in the right mood. 
• This is a very quotable book. I kept my husband entertained with anecdotes and quotes from Murray as I was reading. He enjoyed it as much as I did. 

My only complaint about The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray is that the photos are not all labeled. I like a caption beneath every photo so that I know exactly who I'm looking at and what's going on, even if the subject matter is obvious. Some photos contained captions, many did not.

Highly recommended - Fans of Bill Murray will appreciate this book but beware! As in every case in which you learn about a beloved actor's personality, you may find your opinion of him slightly dimmed by reality (then again, he may become your hero . . . I guess it depends on the reader).  Regardless, it's a terrific, all-encompassing reference, especially if you want to, say, have a Weekend Murraython. Since many of his best and worst comedy skits are also mentioned, The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray is a terrific reference for looking up old Saturday Night Live material and other early Murray skits, as well.

Many thanks to Quirk Books for catching my tweet and kindly offering me a copy of The Big Bad Book of Bill Murray!

©2015 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle by Bob Pflugfelder and Steve Hockensmith

Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle by Bob Pflugfelder and Steve Hockensmith
Book 3 in the Nick and Tesla series
Copyright 2014
Quirk Books - Children's Science Adventure (middle reader)
Source: ARC from Quirk Books

Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle is described on the cover as "A mystery with spy cameras, code wheels and other gadgets you can build yourself."  It's the third in the Nick and Tesla series and, so far, my favorite.

In Secret Agent Gadget Battle, Nick and Tesla receive a partial message from their mother, telling them they're in danger from a spy.  Tesla is relaxed and calm about the message, thinking of ways she can try to identify the spy while Nick's imagination runs wild, everyone around him suddenly appearing to be a threat. With a repairman, two house cleaners and an assistant to Uncle Newt in the house, there are plenty of potential spies to eliminate. When Tesla's pendant goes missing, the kids become serious about figuring out which of the invaders is the spy.

Using code wheels, spy cameras, Nick's own pendant (to tempt the spy-slash-thief) and fingerprint powder, Nick and Tesla work to figure out who is spying on them and eliminate the danger to their lives.

Highly recommended - While the writing in the Nick and Tesla series can be grammatically awkward at times, I love the books for the adventure, the humor and the hands-on science activities. Nick and Tesla's Secret Agent Gadget Battle is my favorite in the series, so far, because it has an interesting cast of potential spies that kept me guessing and some of the dialogue had me chuckling. I particularly loved the interaction between Nick and Tesla at the beginning of the book, when Nick is so nervous that he suspects absolutely everyone. A very entertaining installment in an adventurous series.

©2014 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

World of Trouble by Ben H. Winters

World of Trouble by Ben H. Winters
Book 3 in the Last Policeman series
Copyright 2014 - Mystery/Apocolyptic
Source: Quirk Books
Today is release day (July 15, 2014)!

I didn't mark a single passage in World of Trouble because I was too busy barreling through the book, enjoying the reading and anxious to see how Ben Winters would end the Last Policeman series. The verdict: perfect ending. I honestly don't remember a single series I've ever felt was as completely satisfying as the Last Policeman series. And, World of Trouble is available today!!  For those of you who have been eagerly awaiting release day, I suggest a lot of coffee because you'll want to read World of Trouble in one sitting. Plus, coffee is mentioned frequently enough that you might end up with a craving.

In World of Trouble, only 14 days remain until the asteroid hits Earth. Hank Palace could have easily waited out the end with his friends in Massachusetts but he's determined to find his sister, Nico. So, instead, Hank traveled to Ohio, where he's been told the radicals Nico has been hanging out with have converged to wait for the man they believe will save them by shattering the asteroid.

In Ohio, Hank and a traveling companion find two bloody knives, spatters of blood, a body and a clue to where the radicals may have gone into hiding. To find the missing group, though, he must track down a local man who does concrete work.

With the clock ticking down, Hank tries to solve the crime and find his sister. Will he find Nico before it's too late? What will happen when Hank discovers the "body" has a pulse? Can he solve the attempted murder, uncover the mystery of what's become of Nico's friends and stay alive long enough to find out whether or not the world will truly end?  Well . . . you'll just have to find out. And, I promise you it's worth buying all three books if you haven't already begun reading this series.

Highly recommended - The Last Policeman series is absolutely hands-down, my all-time favorite series. I don't even like mysteries! But, I adore Hank Palace. I love his "just keep living life while you can" attitude. I love the moments of levity, the action, the author's wit. And, the ending is absolutely everything I hoped for and more.  Great series, perfect ending, terrific hero, well worth owning.

My reviews of the first two books in the series:

The Last Policeman
Countdown City

©2014 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Mini time! Countdown City by Ben H. Winters and You Can Date Boys When You're Forty by Dave Barry

Someday I'll catch up on reading and reviews and then my life will be complete, right?  RIGHT?  Okay, I know better but I can dream.  In the meantime . . . some mini reviews.

You've already seen the kit I've prepared for the upcoming fictional apocalypse in the Last Policeman series (and maybe my review of The Last Policeman). On to the second installment.

As Countdown City opens, a mere 77 days remain before an asteroid will collide with Earth. Hank Palace no longer has a paying job as a detective but his former babysitter begs him to locate her husband, who has gone missing -- or "bucket list" as they say in the pre-apocalyptic lingo. Hank has a lingering affection for his old babysitter so he agrees, in spite of the fact that it's no longer possible to do things that were once common like buy gas, use a phone, find coffee.

Hank is tenacious and smart, though, and the missing man is so beloved that he's certain there must be more to the story.

Ben Winters is such a sharp writer.

I squeeze up and down along the edges of my arm and feel nothing and meanwhile my breath is ragged and uneven. At a certain point I will cross a threshold where it won't matter either way; "loss of limb and/or death," that double-conjunction pivot point will resolve decisively on "and."  

~p. 220 of Countdown City

Seriously, how can you not adore his writing? I love the way he can toss out a line of dialogue like, "Love is a bourgeois construct," and in those few words inform you about a character with surprising depth. I love Hank and his wonderful, upbeat attitude. I love the fact that Winters' world building is believable -- the human choices, the way the infrastructure is crumbling.

About 1/2 - 2/3 of the way in, Countdown City becomes seriously edge-of-your-seat exciting. As in the first installment, the story is wrapped up in a satisfying manner -- no cliffhangers, just the knowledge that the end of the world is still coming and, ohmygosh, you have got to get that next book which, by the way is gorgeous ---->

Recommended and, so far, I think the Last Policeman series is worth owning for the sake of revisiting that snappy dialogue. I cannot wait to read the last book.

Dave Barry's latest release, You Can Date Boys When You're Forty is, unfortunately, pretty disappointing, and I don't say that lightly.  I've been a fan of Barry since I was a kid. My father has been gone for almost 24 years but I'll always think of Dave Barry as one of the authors we bonded over, reading passages aloud to each other, laughing, trading his books and giving them as gifts. You Can Date Boys When You're Forty made me laugh out loud a couple times but it also occasionally made me cringe (the section on grammar . . . just, no . . . horrifying, not funny).

I did like the silliness of the essay "Manliness":

Here's what my homeowner tool collection consists of: duct tape, a smallish hammer and 283,000 tiny random pieces of hardware for hanging pictures.  Hanging pictures is my only real manual skill. If we have a global nuclear war and civilization is wiped out and I happen to be one of the small band of surviving humans, I will not be a big help.

First Survivor: I'll forage for edible roots.
Second Survivor: I'll look for water.
Third Survivor: I'll build a shelter from fallen trees.
Me: And I'll hang the pictures!
First Survivor: We'll eat him first.

~p. 32 of You Can Date Boys When You're Forty, ARC (some changes may have been made to the final print copy)

My favorite essay is "Seeking WiFi in the Holy Land," about his family's journey to Israel. His current wife and daughter (if I recall right, he's on his second marriage) are Jewish and their vacation sounded pretty adventurous. The essay is both funny and touching. When Barry left the Yad Vashem museum with tears in his eyes I choked up a bit, myself.

Iffy on recommendation - I liked some of the essays but a few of them were just flat awful so I gave You Can Date Boys When You're Forty an average rating of 3/5. I'd recommend checking it out from the library if you're a fan.

©2014 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Two minis - Spy Smuggler by Jim Eldridge and Nick & Tesla's Robot Army Rampage by Pflugfelder and Hockensmith

Spy Smuggler: Paul Lelaud, France 1942-1944 by Jim Eldridge is the fictional tale of a French teenager living in occupied France.  During the invasion, Paul's father was killed fighting on the Maginot Line, so Paul and his mother have moved in with her brother, a baker.

Paul thinks Uncle Maurice is a coward. Instead of fighting the Germans, he keeps his head down and insists that it's important to get along with them to prevent getting killed. But Uncle Maurice is actually quietly involved in the Resistance.

Spy Smuggler is a well-drawn tale of life in an Occupied France during WWII. Among other things, Paul has Jewish friends who are deported. I thought the author did an exceptional job of placing the reader in the shoes of a young boy who is old enough to feel like he needs to get involved in the fight to get his country back, old enough to understand that terrible things are happening but just innocent enough not to have a full perspective and to need the gentle guidance of his uncle. When his Jewish friends are deported, the story becomes particularly gripping and realistic.

Spy Smuggler also describes the two resistance factions in France and their differing methods as Uncle Maurice and his little circle are placed in danger when the Maquis choose killing over more subtle methods, leading to Nazi retribution.

I've read 2 books from the My Story series and when I read the first I was irritated to find that what I thought was a real-life diary was, in fact, a fictional tale.  I just looked up the series and it appears that Scholastic has listened to complaints about the misleading covers that did not list an author name as the authors' names appear on the most recent releases from the series, at least in the UK. Here's a list of the My Story titles for boys.

Spy Smuggler also contains a timeline of events relevant to the story and a number of period photographs at the back of the book.  I love the extra information included in the My Story books.

Highly recommended for children or adults seeking to learn more about life during WWII.

Nick and Tesla's Robot Army Rampage by "Science Bob" Pflugfelder and Steve Hockensmith is the second in Quirk Books' Nick and Tesla series of middle-grade science mysteries.  I reviewed Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab, recently.

Still living with their nutty absent-minded scientist uncle, Nick and Tesla are surprised to find that their favorite store -- a junky place with loads of fun gadgets and parts for their science experiments -- has been cleaned up; and, equally stunned when their uncle becomes interested in the new owner, a mechanical engineer specializing in robotics. When local businesses become victim to a series of burglaries, Nick and Tesla decide to investigate.

To figure out what's going on, Nick and Tesla must build new gadgets, including tiny robots meant to look like bugs.

The Nick and Tesla series is such fun it almost makes me wish I had children at home so that I'd have an excuse to build little robots.  In this case, I got an ARC that doesn't actually contain one of the templates but I'm sure I'll be able to figure it out if I try.

Highly recommended - Science, mystery, things to build.  What could be more fun? I think the Nick and Tesla books would be especially fun for homeschoolers or parents seeking to keep their children entertained (although you do need to help out with the building process) during breaks from school.

©2014 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

Mini Reviews: Nick & Tesla's High Voltage Danger Lab by Pflugfelder & Hockensmith and Vampires in the Lemon Grove by Karen Russell

I've fallen a little behind so I'm going to do mini reviews, today. Well, sort of mini.  My reviews have been growing longer, lately, so size is a relative term.

Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab by Pflugfelder and Hockensmith is the first book in the Nick and Tesla series published by Quirk Books. I won a copy in a Facebook contest and Eric at Quirk Books not only replaced the book when it disappeared in the mail but also sent the next two titles, which I'm very much looking forward to reading.

In Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab, siblings Nick and Tesla are sent to live with their Uncle Newt, a crazy inventor, while their parents are spending the summer working in Uzbekistan. To fill the time, they make a bottle rocket and launch it but Tesla's special necklace from her parents gets caught on the rocket and lands on fenced property with terrifying guard dogs. In order to distract the dogs so Tesla's pendant can be recovered, the two build a "Robocat Dog Distractor" fueled by Mentos mints and diet cola. Unfortunately, they're not able to retrieve the pendant but during the attempt they discover fishy things are happening on the grounds, make two new friends and, well, the plot thickens. Nick and Tesla eventually solve the mystery, recover the pendant and discover some new facts about their parents.

Highly recommended - Slightly wobbly writing is offset by an enjoyable mystery, an adventurous story and instructions for several science creations that you can make at home. What a great blend of ingredients for youngsters, teachers and anyone else who can stand a little nerdy fun! I told my husband about the robotic cat and he said, "Did they tell you not to use a glass bottle?" "No," I replied, but I told him the instructions specifically listed a 2-liter plastic bottle amongst the supplies. "When Howard did that, he got a couple chunks of glass in his hand," Husband told me. Howard was his childhood-to-college best friend (and the best man at our wedding). From the look in Husband's eyes, just mentioning the robotic cat brought back fond memories.  But, definitely don't use glass to build your robot.

On a side note, engineer husband found the Nick and Tesla books quite exciting and eagerly flipped through Nick and Tesla's High-Voltage Danger Lab to look at instructions for various gadgets you can build at home, once I introduced him to the subject matter. He was like a kid in a candy shop.  I love it when something lights up my husband's eyes that way.

Vampires in the Lemon Grove by Karen Russell is a book of short stories that was sent to me by my sweet friend Sandie, whom you may know from her blog, Booksie's Blog.

I had no idea what I was getting into when I opened Vampires in the Lemon Grove, although it was all over the book-blog world, last year.  The first story is the title story, "Vampires in the Lemon Grove," which is about two elderly, lemon-eating vampires who have marital difficulties after one of them develops a fear of flying. The following stories become weirder and weirder, but the writing is so sharp that my copy is packed with Post-its and I don't know that I ever felt the urge to abandon it, although I definitely thought my head was on the verge of exploding into a shower of lemony chunks, at some points.

There are little bits of her writing that will make you stop to reread or nod your head in recognition at some observation of human behavior. Like this:

That summer Nal was fourteen and looking for excuses to have extreme feelings about himself.  

~p. 54, from "The Seagull Army Descends on Strong Beach, 1979"

Although many of the stories were just a bit too weird for me, I really began to have fun when I reached "The Barn at the End of Our Term," a story that begins by describing a reincarnated U.S. President, Rutherford B. Hayes, now a horse living with a number of other reincarnated presidential horses, a few regular horses who aren't the least bit interested in politics and a smattering of other farm animals. Although I'm not entirely certain I understood what the author was trying to say, I got the impression that the farm was a form of purgatory and one need only jump the fence to move on to heavenly realms.

To Rutherford, this new life hums with the strangeness of the future.  The man has a cavalry of electric beasts that he rides over his acreage: ruby tractors and combines that would have caused Rutherford's constituents to fall off their buggies with shock.  

~p. 116, from "The Barn at the End of Our Term"

Rutherford humorously decides his wife has returned as a goat and follows her everywhere, while the horses debate whether the barn is heaven.

[James Buchanan's] nostrils flare with self-regard.  "I am being rewarded," Buchanan insists, "for annexing Oregon."

"But don't you think Heaven would smell better, Mr. Buchanan?"

~p. 117

I could quote this book all day. Another of my other favorite stories tells the tale of participants in the annual Food Chain Games, for which people gather in the Antarctic to cheer on the whale or the krill.  Team Krill has never had a winning year.

Perhaps it is odd to have rules for tailgating when the Food Chain Games themselves are a lawless bloodbath.  And that is what a lot of fans love about the games: no rules, no refs, no box seats, and no hot pretzels -- not below the Ross Ice Shelf! So take these rules of mine with a grain of salt. That said, I've seen too many senseless deaths over the years. Some people think they can just hop down to the South Pole with a six-pack of Natural Ice and a sweater from the Gap, and that is just not the way we do it for the Food Chain Games. The Team Krill vs. Team Whale match takes place every summer in the most dangerous and remote tailgating site in the world. With the -89° F temperatures and the solar radiation, not to mention the strong katabatic winds off the polar plateau, it can be easy to lose faith and fingers.

~p. 135 from "Dougbert Shackleton's Rules for Antarctic Tailgaiting"

Recommended for lovers of weird but wonderful writing.  Mind officially blown, ready for more from Karen Russell.

©2014 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

The Last Policeman by Ben H. Winters

The Last Policeman by Ben H. Winters

Copyright 2012 

Quirk Books - Fiction/Mystery/Pre-apocalyptic

316 pp.

First sentence:

I'm staring at the insurance man and he's staring at me, two cold gray eyes behind old-fashioned tortoiseshell frames, and I'm having this awful and inspiring feeling, like holy moly this is real, and I don't know if I'm ready, I really don't.

In The Last Policeman, Hank Palace is a young detective who thinks a death by hanging is actually a murder.  He is, however, the only officer who gives a flip about solving the case (if it really is a murder) because the world is going to be hit by an asteroid in approximately 6 months and everyone's going to die, anyway. 

The Last Policeman is pre-apocalyptic in the manner of On the Beach by Nevil Shute (although, the apocalyptic event has already occurred in On the Beach) in that everyone's going to die and they know it. So, The Last Policeman not only explores a possible murder but the reaction of the characters to their impending doom.  But, what makes The Last Policeman really special is the fact that the author has a terrific sense of humor.

I can picture him, the thug resplendent: loops of chain drooping from black jeans, skull-and-crossbones pinky ring, scrawny wrists and forearms crawling with several species of tattoo snakes.  The rat-eyed face twisted with melodramatic outrage, having to answer the phone, take orders from a stuck-up egghead policeman like myself.  But look, I mean, that's what you get for being a drug dealer, and moreover for getting caught, at this juncture in American history. Victor may not know by heart the full text of the Impact Preparation Security and Stabilization Act, but he's got the gist.

~p. 50

No one is really sure--even those of us who have read the eight-hundred-page law from beginning to end, scored it and underlined it, done our best to keep current with the various amendments and codicils--not a hundred percent sure what the "Preparation" parts of IPSS are supposed to be, exactly.  McGully likes to say that sometime around late September they'll start handing out umbrellas.

~p. 53

"You know what I'm doing right now?" I say, watching the muddy liquid rush toward the edge of the table. "I'm thinking: Oh no! The coffee's going to spill onto the floor! I'm so worried! Let's keep talking about it!"

And then the coffee waterfalls over the side of the desk, splashing on Andreas's shoes and pooling on the ground beneath the desk.

"Oh, look at that," I say. "It happened anyway."

~p. 174

You can view the book trailer for The Last Policeman, here.  

Highly recommended - This is such great writing: sharp, hilarious, an instant favorite, the kind of rare book that is so quotable I found myself reading excerpts to my husband (with whom I will only share a passage if I think he'll laugh or a quote will generate a decent discussion -- he laughed, every time).  I particularly love the fact that Hank Palace's attitude to the question, "What do you do when you're going to die in 6 months?" is, "Might as well just keep on working." Whenever someone says something particularly positive about just getting on with life, he always says something to the effect of, "I like that person. Him, I like." Cool.  It's been a few weeks since I read The Last Policeman and I still have that "bounce, bounce, bounce, can't-wait -for-the-next-in-the-series" feeling.

The Last Policeman is a book that was added to my personal collection recently, thanks to the generosity of my friend Sandie. Thanks, Sandie!

©2013 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery  or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.